


caterpillars and corpses

by boom_goes_the_canon



Series: escapades of a young medical student [3]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Canon Era, First Meetings, Fluff, Gen, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Medical students, Science Experiments
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2020-09-05
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:20:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26302570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/boom_goes_the_canon/pseuds/boom_goes_the_canon
Summary: Joly first comes across him one drizzly afternoon. He has hair that defied gravity, scuffed shoes, and he’s lying upside-down in an attempt to sketch a caterpillar on a blueberry bush. Joly immediately decides to adopt him.“Excuse me, monsieur, your feet are in the fountain,” Joly says.
Relationships: Combeferre & Joly (Les Misérables)
Series: escapades of a young medical student [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1963519
Comments: 12
Kudos: 23





	caterpillars and corpses

**Author's Note:**

> For an anon on Tumblr, who prompted: "maybe something with Combeferre and Joly's getting up to shenanigans as the resident medical students of the group ?" I hope you like it!

Joly first comes across him one drizzly afternoon. He has hair that defied gravity, scuffed shoes, and he’s lying upside-down in an attempt to sketch a caterpillar on a blueberry bush. Joly immediately decides to adopt him.

“Excuse me, monsieur, your feet are in the fountain,” Joly says, after clearing his scratchy throat and wrapping his scarf firmly around his limbs. He taps the man on the shoulder, making sure not to disturb his pencil.

“Oh!” The man gives him a sheepish smile and lifts his feet into the air. “I didn’t notice. It is so rare to see a single solitary _Thaumetopoea pityocampa_. I might have lost track of my limbs.” He flops a little, to demonstrate.

“Well, do be careful,” Joly says. “A chill in the extremities quickly proceeds to the torso and could cause illnesses of the lungs, consumption, or even death.”

The man smiles. “I will be careful. And your name?”

“Joly. I’m a medical student, in case it wasn’t obvious.” He shifts nervously from foot to foot, twirling his umbrella. “I hope I didn’t offend you.”

“Not at all. I’m a medical student myself.” He hauls himself up, and manages not to stumble when he does. Joly goggles at him admiringly. “I’m Combeferre.”

-

Joly always shops for corpses with a partner or two. They are very useful for myriad reasons, for bargaining and sneaking out bones and hauling corpses through the streets. A good corpse partner is hard to find.

Thankfully, Combeferre is shaping up to be one.

“I need a corpse!” Joly announces as he knocks. “Let’s go to the morgue.”

“I do need a spleen to study,” Combeferre says in lieu of a greeting, and goes for his hat.

They must look a picture: Combeferre with his coat still liberally splattered and threadbare from whatever adventures he had been on, Joly with his new wardrobe and carefully polished shoes. He wonders if Musichetta will see them, how she will react. She didn’t like the head in her hat box very much.

He will have to stop by the flower shop for an apology bouquet. Perhaps Combeferre could also help him pick one out.

-

“I prescribe wine,” Joly says. “Lots and lots of wine.”

Combeferre keeps a straight face. “Yes. If you could supplement it with a steady diet of sweet cakes and honey, your heart should be better in no time.”

“It was in jest,” Grantaire mutters, and sinks lower in his chair.

-

“It was an extraordinary lung,” Joly mutters. “And he just _snatched_ it.”

“There, there,” Combeferre says. He doesn’t sound very comforting.

“Out of _my_ corpse. Mine! I told him two francs would buy him the left leg and nothing more.” Joly frowns. “And then he refused to help me drag it home, so really, I can’t even get another lung until tomorrow.”

“Unless you steal the lung back, I suppose,” Combeferre says, and squeezes his hand. “I would offer, but I do not have any lungs to spare.”

“Well,” Joly says, the gears turning in his head. “If we steal the lung back, I’ll let you have half.”

“In the middle of the night.”

“Of course!” Joly already has his coat on. “Put your hat on, you’ll catch a cold!”

-

“I told you,” Joly says. “You should have put your hat on.”

Combeferre glares at him from beneath a mountain of blankets and sneezes. He looks quite miserable.

“Well, there’s nothing to it,” Joly says, after a moment’s silence. “Open up and let me see your tongue. We’ll try the tinctures first.”

-

Musichetta meets Combeferre by accident, one sunny day. They were having a quarrel, and she was feeling ill, and Joly had really been silly. She stormed off, determined to consult another medical student for advice.

She turns up on his doorstep with Combeferre, alight with laughter over some pun or another that Combeferre refuses to repeat. “Monsieur Joly, you neglected your introductions,” she says, and presents Combeferre, for all the world like he is her friend and not Joly’s.

Combeferre, to his credit, does not laugh.

-

“As an experiment!” Joly says, holding up the nitrous oxide. “I read a remarkable paper, just the other day, and there is no better time to test it.”

Comberre adjusts his glasses and examines the container. “Very well. My rooms?”

“Of course. Let’s go!”

-

Joly valiantly struggles to keep his eyes open, despite the beguiling warmth of his bed. The pot of coffee had not helped, only making him jittery and no less sleepy. Beside him, Combeferre counts cracks on the ceiling firmly and with dignity.

“Do you feel the pull of the magnetic currents?” Joly whispers, for that was the point of the experiment.

“I feel the pull of sleep. Eighty-nine. Ninety.”

“But don’t you feel a sort of tingling in your toes, and in your fingers?”

“I think that might be the coffee,” Combeferre says. “Ninety-three. Ninety-ten.”

Joly sighs and gets up to reorient the bed.

-

“Do you ever just think about cats, Combeferre?” Joly whispers. He had taken some sort of concoction from a senior doctor, hoping to find some improvement in his health. His head was floating somewhere in the firmament and his feet seemed anchored to the center of the earth, and he hadn’t been able to take more than a step without collapsing in a heap.

“Go to sleep,” Combeferre says.

“But cats can be round and long and short and drippy…” He waves a hand towards the ceiling. “Cats might be some novel new state of material! We should write a paper.”

Combeferre sighs and checks Joly’s pulse once again.

-

“That is not how you suture, Joly.”

Joly squints at the needle. “It is! Oh dear, I think this is Musichetta’s.”

Combeferre wrinkles his nose. “You have been sewing corpses up with that?”

“Oh no, just myself and Bossuet.”

-

“Look, Combeferre, Grantaire and I concocted candies out of laudanum.” Joly presents the brown squares with considerable pride. “For medical consumption.”

Combeferre reaches out. Joly swats his hand away.

“Three sous, please.”

-

“Combeferre, you need to sleep.”

“No,” Combeferre says. His face is hidden behind a book, but Joly is pretty sure he’s pouting.

“Combeferre.”

“Just one last book.”

“You must get a good night’s sleep.” Joly snatches the book away. “Remember the incident of the magnets.”

Combeferre turns pleading eyes on him. “One chapter.”

“Combeferre,” Joly repeats, chiding. “Did someone allow you near a coffee pot again?”

He dodges the question, a sure sign of guilt. “…Maybe three chapters?”

-

“Political opinions?” Joly repeats, tapping the head of his cane on his nose. “Only the normal ones.”

“Oh,” Combeferre says. He sounds disappointed.

Joly takes a deep breath. “The monarchy and the elites should of course be overthrown, and free education and voting rights given to all.”

Combeferre clears his throat. He doesn’t sound disappointed anymore. “Do you know the back room of the Café Musain?”

**Author's Note:**

>  _Thaumetopoea pityocampa_ is the pine processionary, interesting as both a caterpillar and a moth.


End file.
